The way my daughter sometimes stopped talking when my husband entered a room.
The drawings she hid.
The questions she asked and then pretended weren’t important.
The way she had started asking whether I would be angry if she told me something.
I had thought she was going through a phase.
She hadn’t been.
She had been testing whether it was safe to speak.
The pediatrician asked my husband, “Did you tell your daughter to keep secrets from her mother?”
He rubbed both hands over his face.
“I was trying to protect her.”
“From what?”
He looked at me.
“From you.”
I almost laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because it was unbelievable.
“From me?”
“You were constantly fighting with my mother.”
“I disagreed with her.”
“You made everything difficult.”
My daughter covered her ears.
The pediatrician immediately said, “Stop.”
My husband looked at her.
“She doesn’t need to hear this.”
